A personal exploration of autism from a brother’s perspective, including family relationships, philosophy, neuroscience, mental health history and ethics

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The Muses

Musical notation is written on paper that has rows of grouped parallel lines. Five lines in each group. A spot (which may or may not have a staff) on a line is a note whose duration depends upon whether it is hollow, its grouping with other spots and the number of flags on its staff. The pitch of the note depends the line upon which it resides. It is necessary to have this regular, rule-heavy notation, so any musician anywhere in the world will be able to convert the markings on paper to the same music the composer wrote.

I began today’s study with five curvy lines that I wanted to represent the sound music makes; the intertwining of curves to represent the interaction of tones, a visual metaphor for harmonizing tones. I modified the original figures on the left hand side of the paper to become the ovoid blue figures from which the music emanated. Each musician, downstream from these muses will be inspired and will hear music different from anyone else.